Harkening back to a few days ago--there was an appreciably positive response to Mojang's (and by extension, Microsoft's) formal declaration rejecting the implementation of an NFT marketplace within Minecraft, as being contrary to their gameplay model and course of development. Youtube personality Alanah Pierce (who praised the move) did what I thought was a pretty good layperson's explanation as to the potential conflict of design between the NFT commerce model and Minecraft as a game, which I appreciated.
(For those who are unfamiliar, Alanah was associated for many years with the Roosterteeth-owned channel Funhaus. She's probably one of my favorite members, or at least rated among the least likely to rely on channel's usual smug sarcasm combined with acceptably xenophobic jokes about foreigners, seeing how she's Australian herself.)
Finally got back to finishing Halo 4, that was anticlimactic for a final level even by Halo standards. Started playing 5 and shit, now we’re back to splitting game time with some not-MC loser with tryhard loser armor. Old Cortana with the not uncanny valley face, play Linkin Park for me mixed with Evanescence.
Halo 5 really bigged up the Locke vs Chief fight
Then it never really went anywhere. A punch up in a cut scene then they see each other at the end.
Great.
Super mega spoilers for Halo Infinite so do not click on this unless you've played H4, H5 and H:I. Or if you don't really care
I actually liked the concept of H5. A fragment of Cortana has gone full fucking rampant, started an AI revolution and is trying to take control of the galaxy.
Only issue, the fan reaction to H5 was so bad that the sequel (H:I) is basically a full on soft reset of the entire plot. The banished replace the covenant, and that AI revolution/Cortana plot line? Forget about it, she's fucking dead before you even start the game.
Oh and the big bad is something called the Endless. WHO?
It makes H5 retroactively worse, because you know none of that shit goes anywhere.
If they went for it instead of being wishy washy, it may have worked. But you could tell they didn't have confidence in Sargent Blueface or whatever (who I guess got killed off between games) so unlike the masterful bait and switch of Raiden in MGS2, we got... Whatever that was
343 is in a frustrating pattern. 4 expands the lore of Master Chief and focuses on his characterization. Okay, so I guess developing his character and putting him in unusual situations will be a priority from now on, huh? Oh, nope, 4's Spartan Ops and 5's campaign are mostly about the expanded universe and characters other than Chief. Okay, so I guess a more complicated world situation that isn't just trying to capture the marketing hype of the original trilogy is what they're going to focus on from here out, huh? Halo Infinite... deletes the world situation and puts every non-Chief character on an express bus out of the storyline. So what ACTUALLY are you guys doing over there? Seems like a whole lot of nothing!
What were the wider reactions to those first two games?
4s campaign was well received, helped that the graphics were amazing for a 360 game. Apparently it’s multiplayer wasn’t great. The reverse for 5, it’s multiplayer was supposedly good but it’s campaign was poorly received. Halo 5s campaign isn’t like amazingly bad in my opinion, it has some great moments, but it really felt like they didn’t have a good sense of why they were doing what they were doing. It felt like the narrative was getting away from them, getting unwieldy. doing basically a soft reset for Infinites narrative was the right call in the long run in my opinion
Infinite just feels weird cos it’s this fantastic game at its core but has the frayed edges and all the hallmarks of a development hell game that barely made it across the finish line. and it’s like, this is your flagship ip, your flagship studio, 3 games in, it shouldn’t be this frenetic and desperate.
It’s clear that the studio was either mismanaged or a series of issues just piled up all at once and conspired to make it hell (engine, covid, development originally targeting Xbox one only)
I hope they manage to turn it around but I’m not sure what would be needed to achieve that.
If they went for it instead of being wishy washy, it may have worked. But you could tell they didn't have confidence in Sargent Blueface or whatever (who I guess got killed off between games) so unlike the masterful bait and switch of Raiden in MGS2, we got... Whatever that was
343 is in a frustrating pattern. 4 expands the lore of Master Chief and focuses on his characterization. Okay, so I guess developing his character and putting him in unusual situations will be a priority from now on, huh? Oh, nope, 4's Spartan Ops and 5's campaign are mostly about the expanded universe and characters other than Chief. Okay, so I guess a more complicated world situation that isn't just trying to capture the marketing hype of the original trilogy is what they're going to focus on from here out, huh? Halo Infinite... deletes the world situation and puts every non-Chief character on an express bus out of the storyline. So what ACTUALLY are you guys doing over there? Seems like a whole lot of nothing!
What were the wider reactions to those first two games?
There were loud, vocal complaints about Halo 2--I'd see it as classic sequel blacklash, and I don't think anyone can deny it shares a lot in common even it wasn't a perfect example--particularly at the inclusion of the Arbiter sections (which were largely a surprise), and at John-117's increased conversations (not that he talks a great deal in 2, but it's still a massive amount compared to CE). The former part, in particular, has a lot of appreciators (I'm one), but there was definitely a lot of vocal dislike of it going several years (right up to Halo 3 I think; I don't think it's a coincidence that there's no sections comparable in 3, and instead 3 other players can play nonspecific elites in co-op only). It was absolutely divisive. I think it's not crazy to see a pattern here with the loudest part of the fanbase (similar complaints were levied at successive novels, though those are obviously a more limited audience); I say this as someone who prefers the characterization in 5 to 6, personally (which I'm not going to claim is a common opinion, especially on the PA Forums where we've had great thread titles like "Halo 5 is the worse game ever made. Seriously.").
Seems a good time to ask: I can get my wife to co-op play through exactly one Halo. Which one is best for co-op? Also, we'll probably be playing on easy.
Seems a good time to ask: I can get my wife to co-op play through exactly one Halo. Which one is best for co-op? Also, we'll probably be playing on easy.
That's difficult. They all have pretty good co-op; the biggest addition of is probably the implementation of 4-player co-op in 3 (and everything going forward), but that's not a must have if you're only playing with 2 people. So it boils down to which one of these games you like the most.
Halo CE is pretty effectively the start of the story, which is important in setting the general rules of the setting (especially taken with something like Reach, which even among its biggest fans, is fundamentally a prequel that expects more than a little prior knowledge). And it's a good game, but undeniably dated in certain ways, especially with certain franchise upgrades (vehicle damage models, small weapon selection, etc.), simpler level designs, etc. The Anniversary Edition is probably a hard requirement from a cosmetic standpoint, unless both of you really find the very old visual design charming.
Halo 2 is designed more with co-op in mind; also the Anniversary Edition release is honestly pretty good looking (or at least relatively "modern"). No later game has gotten a graphical remaster. 3 is also good for co-op. A lot of people prefer that sort of "elegant simplicity" of CE, but you may not. ODST is popular, but it's a very esoteric story (and you spend a lot of time traveling through hub world, classic Quake style). That could be a positive or a negative.
Reach as noted is among the most prequel of prequels. A lot of its praise goes to that, but it could be lost on a newcomer--I have really never heard of anyone recommending someone go into Halo completely blank with Reach as a starting point. Also it's the buggiest of Halo titles by a long margin (an odd complaint, as these are not really buggy first person shooters, but it is), maybe reflecting Bungie getting long in the tooth on the Xbox 360 hardware.
4 has a robust co-op, and is part of the shift towards more modern singleplayer trappings (if you like those or not). But as with Reach, it assumes a great deal of pre-existing knowledge of the franchise as the start of the new arc. 5 is the same, except it fully embraces modern FPS conventions (it most closely resembles Titanfall or even Apex, with jetpacks, sprinting, mantling and aiming down sights); some people really hate this, other people like it. Notably, it added co-op revival (in singleplayer as well, assuming the AI doesn't get killed) as in Gears of War and a few other games, which is potentially a huge deal in co-op; reviving someone takes a second or two, but they need to be accessible and you both get a shield boost after it. Still, it would be a really awkward place to start narratively, and I say this as a person who has played through the co-op multiple times and enjoyed it every time. Graphically, it's the best looking of the games up to that point, even considering it hasn't gotten a Xbox Series enhancement (it's a very good looking Xbox One X game).
Infinite is going to get co-op soon. It's still a narratively awkward place to start I'd argue, but the biggest deal might be that it's the first open-world nonlinear title in the series. That's a huge deal probably; we're not talking a map inundated with side quests Assassin's Creed style, but there are some of those, as with Gears 5.
If narrative matters to her, I'd say start with CE and see if she's interested in continuing after that. Either way then works; CE works fine as a story on its own, but of course has also laid much of the groundwork for the sequels.
Powerwashing Simulator is... You should play it. I lost hours to that damn thing. I don't even understand, but by god did that patio get clean.
i unlocked the last achievement earlier, the one for getting Gold in 5 Challenges, and felt absolutely euphoric! installed it just to check it out when it became available and have poured over 50 hours into it since. it does not take long for it to gets it hooks in. and god does that campaign go places, its wild. definitely second the recommendation.
I hadn't realised that it was on the Xbox. It'll be a get at some point. I really enjoy games that are just chill stuff. Put some thing on in the background to listen to and just do whatever. Car Mechanic Simulator is highly recommended for that, though I don't know how well it would play on the console. For Steam I have the steam controller in one hand and my mouse in the other. Not sure it would be as chill if I had to hold a controller in both hands. But the basic part of the game is still just pure time waster without needing any serious thought.
The response to Powerwash Simulator is like....near-universally positive. It's one of those games that, like House Flipper, I've thought of trying but never did. I'm not really playing many "chill" games simply for want of time.
It's a game that provides instantaneous feedback that shit's getting done. Plus, it taps into that need/compulsion to scan back and forth on a map in a game to reveal everything. I've only seen videos to know that it can be very satisfying indeed.
House Flipper is a game I'm not entirely satisfied with. Doing the 'missions' is fine, but once I finished those, it's now up to me to flip a house and I'm kind of lost for what I should be doing or not doing. (I understand I'm supposed to so stuff that appeals to a buyer. I just feel it would be better to have the buyer specifically 'hire' me to do the stuff rather than just do the stuff and the buyer decides they like it.) I'm on the fence on that one.
If Drug Dealer Simulator came to Xbox I'd probably get it. As it is, I'd want a bluetooth keyboard to make playing on Steam a better experience. It's too annoying to try and do a split controller/mouse setup for it because both 'E' and the LMB do different functions and you can't remap the mouse without a third party program and I'm just lazy.
yeah i decided to try House Flipper after finishing PowerWash Simulator and while its not bad, i'm definitely not enjoying it as much so far. just doesn't scratch that itch in the same way that PWS did.
If narrative matters to her, I'd say start with CE and see if she's interested in continuing after that. Either way then works; CE works fine as a story on its own, but of course has also laid much of the groundwork for the sequels.
Narrative doesn't matter at all, it's going to be eye rolling at blah blah modified supersoldier blah blah big alien threats. Really looking for the funnest mechanics/co-op more than anything. The biggest draw as far as the narrative/setting is the violence is fantasy violence vs. a military game with people-people.
Justice on
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TexiKenDammit!That fish really got me!Registered Userregular
4 felt like they forgot about Cortana breaking down except for the final level, the Didact was weak as hell as a villain and Chief unlocking his haki because mindlink or something with a librarian (neeeeerd) felt like it was pulled out of 343's ass.
All I constantly feel from the 343 games is they are rushed despite having years of development and pretty much infinite (ha!) resources, maybe 5 at the end doesn't feel this way, the story is much more scattershot and I'm lost half the time, and I think someone in the company high up has a weird spartan armor ASMR fetish of clacking plastics together because that's all I hear in cutscenes.
343 lacks focus and commitment, ultimately. 4 is about the renewed strength of the Forerunners... nah we're bored of this now, that threat and plotline is over in a comic book that 1/100th of the audience will read. Now we're all about the threat of unshackled AI! Hmm, you know what, this might not have been it. The new threat is The Banished, who are The Covenant but more EXTREME and MAD! Actually, we got bored of them before we even finished making their game, their leader is... dead offscreen. Now this is about The Endless, a faction that even The Forerunners were like, "Whoa! Chill out!" (Which might have meant something to the audience if we had focused on the Forerunners for longer than 10 seconds.)
Also, both Cortana's death and Atriox's death are taken back in a cutscene, but since we completely failed to sell either one of those... um woo?
343 lacks focus and commitment, ultimately. 4 is about the renewed strength of the Forerunners... nah we're bored of this now, that threat and plotline is over in a comic book that 1/100th of the audience will read. Now we're all about the threat of unshackled AI! Hmm, you know what, this might not have been it. The new threat is The Banished, who are The Covenant but more EXTREME and MAD! Actually, we got bored of them before we even finished making their game, their leader is... dead offscreen. Now this is about The Endless, a faction that even The Forerunners were like, "Whoa! Chill out!" (Which might have meant something to the audience if we had focused on the Forerunners for longer than 10 seconds.)
Also, both Cortana's death and Atriox's death are taken back in a cutscene, but since we completely failed to sell either one of those... um woo?
Isn't Cortana
deffo dead? The weapon is picking a name but it's technically not Cortana?
343 lacks focus and commitment, ultimately. 4 is about the renewed strength of the Forerunners... nah we're bored of this now, that threat and plotline is over in a comic book that 1/100th of the audience will read. Now we're all about the threat of unshackled AI! Hmm, you know what, this might not have been it. The new threat is The Banished, who are The Covenant but more EXTREME and MAD! Actually, we got bored of them before we even finished making their game, their leader is... dead offscreen. Now this is about The Endless, a faction that even The Forerunners were like, "Whoa! Chill out!" (Which might have meant something to the audience if we had focused on the Forerunners for longer than 10 seconds.)
Also, both Cortana's death and Atriox's death are taken back in a cutscene, but since we completely failed to sell either one of those... um woo?
Isn't Cortana
deffo dead? The weapon is picking a name but it's technically not Cortana?
Infinite Spoilers
The Weapon is a complete copy of Cortana before any of the going crazy that happened in 5. So... it's the Cortana everyone knows and likes again, the dead one is the one that everyone hated. What a compelling twist!!! Not.
343 lacks focus and commitment, ultimately. 4 is about the renewed strength of the Forerunners... nah we're bored of this now, that threat and plotline is over in a comic book that 1/100th of the audience will read. Now we're all about the threat of unshackled AI! Hmm, you know what, this might not have been it. The new threat is The Banished, who are The Covenant but more EXTREME and MAD! Actually, we got bored of them before we even finished making their game, their leader is... dead offscreen. Now this is about The Endless, a faction that even The Forerunners were like, "Whoa! Chill out!" (Which might have meant something to the audience if we had focused on the Forerunners for longer than 10 seconds.)
Also, both Cortana's death and Atriox's death are taken back in a cutscene, but since we completely failed to sell either one of those... um woo?
Isn't Cortana
deffo dead? The weapon is picking a name but it's technically not Cortana?
Infinite Spoilers
The Weapon is a complete copy of Cortana before any of the going crazy that happened in 5. So... it's the Cortana everyone knows and likes again, the dead one is the one that everyone hated. What a compelling twist!!! Not.
Eeeeeh kinda:
She's Cortana, minus "ever met Master Chief"; none of the maturation, change, growth from the games, so much closer to "Cortana, but with zero life experience". Same in a way, but also not the same person. I definitely don't feel like Taylor's going to play her as, nor will they be writing her as, "Same Cortana just not crazy now is all".
HEY GUYS! I finally got an ERROR CODE IN GAME PASS!!! I've been fucking with this thing since I last posted about it. I've created a new account on my pc to try that out, and nope. Reset/Unintall/Reinstall/SFC /scannow/wsreset/reboot, shut down, reboot, reboot. Not really sure what did it. I NUKED everything from orbit, deleted all the downloaded files that worked in 2 directories(one on C cuz it has to put it there, and one on my game SSD). But finally, out of no where, I got an ERROR! Then, then then then then...I did basically what I've already done a bajizillion times, rebooted, and I'm downloading!
Anyone remember what game it was that had me downloading something new? heh
Vent and aim? There's a forum/chat aspect to it as well, I think. Which I hate because so much video game discussion had moved into that walled garden and isn't googleable
As noted, its a big merged service--video streaming, audio channels, and semi-organized chat boards. But I'm not sure how many of these functions are actually coming to the Xbox UI integration. That's why 99% of the discussion is over the voicecom functions.
Discord is already on Xbox (and playstation) but I'm fairly certain it's just the text chat portion that works at the moment, which is fairly useless for a console unless you have a keyboard hooked up. I guess you could use the Xbox phone app to type into it but then like... Just use the discord phone app...
Since they introduced crossplay to a lot of games, having a cross platform voice chat system is something that's been needed for a while now. Our destiny community got a lot stronger with crossplay but all the console folks typically use the phone app to join voice parties and it's an inelegant solution. But the Xbox wireless headset does work a charm for that.
Since they introduced crossplay to a lot of games, having a cross platform voice chat system is something that's been needed for a while now. Our destiny community got a lot stronger with crossplay but all the console folks typically use the phone app to join voice parties and it's an inelegant solution. But the Xbox wireless headset does work a charm for that.
That's an excellent use case--I don't play any cross-platform titles (the closest I'd be would be Fortnite, and i'm only partying up with people on Xbox if anyone at all), I hadn't even considered that.
Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion for Xbox patched out the numerous errors that ruined the end of the game completely, and it only took... like 3 months. Turned what could have been a memey fun time into a mess. If you're the type who cares about achievements, it is safe to return to at this time.
I bought Bloodstained back when it first came to Xbox, well before Game Pass. As far as I can tell, great game (with a very nice visual package; apparently it got hobbled pretty bad for the Switch release), but I'm so bad at this genre (Castlevania clones) that I'm also stuck shortly before the final battle in the Record of Lodoss War: Deedlit's Wonderland game as well.
I turns out that the 360E is not more stable. I just had a more fortunate time whilst platin WET. Sleeping Dogs is seeing quite a few more drops. (Yesterday was my free day and even with ~20Mbps it would still drop. Though not as often. It makes me think it could be a NAT thing. Which I can't resolve in any way.)
At any rate, SD is generally fun. Combat is stiff and driving is awkward, but that is probably not helped by the 360 controller as compared to a X1.
Camera controls in vehicle are a nightmare. They seem to be set to automatically centre behind the vehicle, which is ordinarily fine, but when reversing (especially on a bike) trying to swivel the camera to see behind you results in an awkward fight trying to swing it back around to go forward.
Also, too, everybody is driving on the wrong side of the road.
I turns out that the 360E is not more stable. I just had a more fortunate time whilst platin WET. Sleeping Dogs is seeing quite a few more drops. (Yesterday was my free day and even with ~20Mbps it would still drop. Though not as often. It makes me think it could be a NAT thing. Which I can't resolve in any way.)
At any rate, SD is generally fun. Combat is stiff and driving is awkward, but that is probably not helped by the 360 controller as compared to a X1.
Camera controls in vehicle are a nightmare. They seem to be set to automatically centre behind the vehicle, which is ordinarily fine, but when reversing (especially on a bike) trying to swivel the camera to see behind you results in an awkward fight trying to swing it back around to go forward.
Also, too, everybody is driving on the wrong side of the road.
Depending on what you mean by "stability", you might've been mislead. The last console revision of the Xbox 360 doesn't offer any better performance (it's just doing it from slightly smaller, notably cheaper-to-produce hardware); the only advantage is that it was newer. The original Xbox 360 "Red ring" problems were directly addressed even before the Xbox 360 S was released, effectively "solved" by any probability; right now, in 2022 pretty much all the hardware is going to be old, so instead you're looking at any number of other possible problems unfortunately. I don't want to think of all the times I've brought my PS3 (80 GB model) in to get fixed, and I had to pay for a new PSU for my original Xbox on top of that (I gave up on Playstation 2s after multiple consoles entirely, hence the PS3).
I mean online stability. I'd hoped that different hardware might resilt in a more stable connection. All Xbox hardware apparently recommends 3Mbps down speed. (I'm at ~2Mbps.)
The X1 has almost never dropped connection by comparison. At least I cannot remember a single time it has whilst playing anything. The X1 stays connected so I had higher hopes for a newer generation of 360 hardware.
I mean online stability. I'd hoped that different hardware might resilt in a more stable connection. All Xbox hardware apparently recommends 3Mbps down speed. (I'm at ~2Mbps.)
The X1 has almost never dropped connection by comparison. At least I cannot remember a single time it has whilst playing anything. The X1 stays connected so I had higher hopes for a newer generation of 360 hardware.
Oh yeah, that. Unsurprising we've come a long way when it comes to even wired broadband modem connections.
Some of these were available via Steam or GOG, while others were tied up in increasingly strange licensing issues, or both. In any case, the modern titles are effectively just the now old Steam re-releases, with all the problems that comes up with, but for the even older titles Microsoft's done a distribution with DosBox (again, very much like Steam) with a few very sparse quality of life improvements. The whole thing smacks of "absolute minimum effort because it's free", but it's still interesting since these represent both old id and now upcoming Activision acquisitions, and this notion that Windows and Xbox might want to distribute these old games as part of their expanded library. DosBox on Xbox Series (officially)? Who knows.
The Elder Scrolls: Arena's box art is so incredibly Of Its Time, isn't it. And it looks so unremarkable at first glance. But from little acorns, etc etc.
Rgarding Discord, yeah, I'm sure that'll be handy for cross-platform chat on crossplay games. The only crossplay game I tend to frequent these days is PUBG on Xbox, and that already has cross-platform chat with PlayStation players (PC is obviously walled off on its own for good reason). But I'm sure there'll be something else someday, and cross-platform chat in games that don't support it natively is going to be a big QoL improvement.
Oh most games do have crossplay chat in-game but usually the audio quality is very poor, and cuts out during things like loading times and stuff. That's how destiny is, it's fine if it's the only option but not ideal for chatting with larger groups of people not in game with you
Oh most games do have crossplay chat in-game but usually the audio quality is very poor, and cuts out during things like loading times and stuff. That's how destiny is, it's fine if it's the only option but not ideal for chatting with larger groups of people not in game with you
Yeah, the loading times thing has hit me even in just Xbox-only games since time immemorial. Going into party chat has been the go-to solution for as long as I can remember.
I have literally never played a game with voice chat going where I'm talking to people not in the game, I don't think. Unless it was an IRL friend as we're sorting out what to play and then loading it up or something.
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I'm a fan of Alanah's, but I hadn't watched this video. Sounds like it addresses just the sort of thing I was wondering about here, though!
Like Mega Man Legends? Then check out my story, Legends of the Halcyon Era - An Adventure in the World of Mega Man Legends on TMMN and AO3!
Halo 5 really bigged up the Locke vs Chief fight
Great.
Super mega spoilers for Halo Infinite so do not click on this unless you've played H4, H5 and H:I. Or if you don't really care
Only issue, the fan reaction to H5 was so bad that the sequel (H:I) is basically a full on soft reset of the entire plot. The banished replace the covenant, and that AI revolution/Cortana plot line? Forget about it, she's fucking dead before you even start the game.
Oh and the big bad is something called the Endless. WHO?
It makes H5 retroactively worse, because you know none of that shit goes anywhere.
What were the wider reactions to those first two games?
Infinite just feels weird cos it’s this fantastic game at its core but has the frayed edges and all the hallmarks of a development hell game that barely made it across the finish line. and it’s like, this is your flagship ip, your flagship studio, 3 games in, it shouldn’t be this frenetic and desperate.
It’s clear that the studio was either mismanaged or a series of issues just piled up all at once and conspired to make it hell (engine, covid, development originally targeting Xbox one only)
I hope they manage to turn it around but I’m not sure what would be needed to achieve that.
There were loud, vocal complaints about Halo 2--I'd see it as classic sequel blacklash, and I don't think anyone can deny it shares a lot in common even it wasn't a perfect example--particularly at the inclusion of the Arbiter sections (which were largely a surprise), and at John-117's increased conversations (not that he talks a great deal in 2, but it's still a massive amount compared to CE). The former part, in particular, has a lot of appreciators (I'm one), but there was definitely a lot of vocal dislike of it going several years (right up to Halo 3 I think; I don't think it's a coincidence that there's no sections comparable in 3, and instead 3 other players can play nonspecific elites in co-op only). It was absolutely divisive. I think it's not crazy to see a pattern here with the loudest part of the fanbase (similar complaints were levied at successive novels, though those are obviously a more limited audience); I say this as someone who prefers the characterization in 5 to 6, personally (which I'm not going to claim is a common opinion, especially on the PA Forums where we've had great thread titles like "Halo 5 is the worse game ever made. Seriously.").
That's difficult. They all have pretty good co-op; the biggest addition of is probably the implementation of 4-player co-op in 3 (and everything going forward), but that's not a must have if you're only playing with 2 people. So it boils down to which one of these games you like the most.
Halo CE is pretty effectively the start of the story, which is important in setting the general rules of the setting (especially taken with something like Reach, which even among its biggest fans, is fundamentally a prequel that expects more than a little prior knowledge). And it's a good game, but undeniably dated in certain ways, especially with certain franchise upgrades (vehicle damage models, small weapon selection, etc.), simpler level designs, etc. The Anniversary Edition is probably a hard requirement from a cosmetic standpoint, unless both of you really find the very old visual design charming.
Halo 2 is designed more with co-op in mind; also the Anniversary Edition release is honestly pretty good looking (or at least relatively "modern"). No later game has gotten a graphical remaster. 3 is also good for co-op. A lot of people prefer that sort of "elegant simplicity" of CE, but you may not. ODST is popular, but it's a very esoteric story (and you spend a lot of time traveling through hub world, classic Quake style). That could be a positive or a negative.
Reach as noted is among the most prequel of prequels. A lot of its praise goes to that, but it could be lost on a newcomer--I have really never heard of anyone recommending someone go into Halo completely blank with Reach as a starting point. Also it's the buggiest of Halo titles by a long margin (an odd complaint, as these are not really buggy first person shooters, but it is), maybe reflecting Bungie getting long in the tooth on the Xbox 360 hardware.
4 has a robust co-op, and is part of the shift towards more modern singleplayer trappings (if you like those or not). But as with Reach, it assumes a great deal of pre-existing knowledge of the franchise as the start of the new arc. 5 is the same, except it fully embraces modern FPS conventions (it most closely resembles Titanfall or even Apex, with jetpacks, sprinting, mantling and aiming down sights); some people really hate this, other people like it. Notably, it added co-op revival (in singleplayer as well, assuming the AI doesn't get killed) as in Gears of War and a few other games, which is potentially a huge deal in co-op; reviving someone takes a second or two, but they need to be accessible and you both get a shield boost after it. Still, it would be a really awkward place to start narratively, and I say this as a person who has played through the co-op multiple times and enjoyed it every time. Graphically, it's the best looking of the games up to that point, even considering it hasn't gotten a Xbox Series enhancement (it's a very good looking Xbox One X game).
Infinite is going to get co-op soon. It's still a narratively awkward place to start I'd argue, but the biggest deal might be that it's the first open-world nonlinear title in the series. That's a huge deal probably; we're not talking a map inundated with side quests Assassin's Creed style, but there are some of those, as with Gears 5.
Something to consider, hope that helps.
Steam | XBL
yeah i decided to try House Flipper after finishing PowerWash Simulator and while its not bad, i'm definitely not enjoying it as much so far. just doesn't scratch that itch in the same way that PWS did.
Narrative doesn't matter at all, it's going to be eye rolling at blah blah modified supersoldier blah blah big alien threats. Really looking for the funnest mechanics/co-op more than anything. The biggest draw as far as the narrative/setting is the violence is fantasy violence vs. a military game with people-people.
All I constantly feel from the 343 games is they are rushed despite having years of development and pretty much infinite (ha!) resources, maybe 5 at the end doesn't feel this way, the story is much more scattershot and I'm lost half the time, and I think someone in the company high up has a weird spartan armor ASMR fetish of clacking plastics together because that's all I hear in cutscenes.
Isn't Cortana
Infinite Spoilers
Eeeeeh kinda:
Anyone remember what game it was that had me downloading something new? heh
Discord is the new Ventrilo?
Vent and aim? There's a forum/chat aspect to it as well, I think. Which I hate because so much video game discussion had moved into that walled garden and isn't googleable
I wonder where vent went wrong? They were ubiquitous back in the day.
Steam | XBL
As noted, its a big merged service--video streaming, audio channels, and semi-organized chat boards. But I'm not sure how many of these functions are actually coming to the Xbox UI integration. That's why 99% of the discussion is over the voicecom functions.
PS - Local_H_Jay
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And Twitch
PS - Local_H_Jay
Sub me on Youtube
And Twitch
That's an excellent use case--I don't play any cross-platform titles (the closest I'd be would be Fortnite, and i'm only partying up with people on Xbox if anyone at all), I hadn't even considered that.
I beat Aria of Sorrow back in the day, but that’s the only one I’ve played
XBL - Foreverender | 3DS FC - 1418 6696 1012 | Steam ID | LoL
Aria is easily the best of those three, so keep that in mind for your choosing.
True, but Aria is fantastic, so a game could still be very good without being up to Aria's level
However, I probably will go with Bloodstained just for all the newness and bigger discount
XBL - Foreverender | 3DS FC - 1418 6696 1012 | Steam ID | LoL
At any rate, SD is generally fun. Combat is stiff and driving is awkward, but that is probably not helped by the 360 controller as compared to a X1.
Camera controls in vehicle are a nightmare. They seem to be set to automatically centre behind the vehicle, which is ordinarily fine, but when reversing (especially on a bike) trying to swivel the camera to see behind you results in an awkward fight trying to swing it back around to go forward.
Also, too, everybody is driving on the wrong side of the road.
Depending on what you mean by "stability", you might've been mislead. The last console revision of the Xbox 360 doesn't offer any better performance (it's just doing it from slightly smaller, notably cheaper-to-produce hardware); the only advantage is that it was newer. The original Xbox 360 "Red ring" problems were directly addressed even before the Xbox 360 S was released, effectively "solved" by any probability; right now, in 2022 pretty much all the hardware is going to be old, so instead you're looking at any number of other possible problems unfortunately. I don't want to think of all the times I've brought my PS3 (80 GB model) in to get fixed, and I had to pay for a new PSU for my original Xbox on top of that (I gave up on Playstation 2s after multiple consoles entirely, hence the PS3).
The X1 has almost never dropped connection by comparison. At least I cannot remember a single time it has whilst playing anything. The X1 stays connected so I had higher hopes for a newer generation of 360 hardware.
Oh yeah, that. Unsurprising we've come a long way when it comes to even wired broadband modem connections.
Some of these were available via Steam or GOG, while others were tied up in increasingly strange licensing issues, or both. In any case, the modern titles are effectively just the now old Steam re-releases, with all the problems that comes up with, but for the even older titles Microsoft's done a distribution with DosBox (again, very much like Steam) with a few very sparse quality of life improvements. The whole thing smacks of "absolute minimum effort because it's free", but it's still interesting since these represent both old id and now upcoming Activision acquisitions, and this notion that Windows and Xbox might want to distribute these old games as part of their expanded library. DosBox on Xbox Series (officially)? Who knows.
Rgarding Discord, yeah, I'm sure that'll be handy for cross-platform chat on crossplay games. The only crossplay game I tend to frequent these days is PUBG on Xbox, and that already has cross-platform chat with PlayStation players (PC is obviously walled off on its own for good reason). But I'm sure there'll be something else someday, and cross-platform chat in games that don't support it natively is going to be a big QoL improvement.
Steam | XBL
PS - Local_H_Jay
Sub me on Youtube
And Twitch
Yeah, the loading times thing has hit me even in just Xbox-only games since time immemorial. Going into party chat has been the go-to solution for as long as I can remember.
I have literally never played a game with voice chat going where I'm talking to people not in the game, I don't think. Unless it was an IRL friend as we're sorting out what to play and then loading it up or something.
Steam | XBL